


Magi: The One Shot Collection of Reader-Insert

by SuYeon



Category: Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Cuddling & Snuggling, Developing Relationship, Established Relationship, F/F, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Jealousy, Love, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Platonic Relationships, Reader-Insert, Relationship Will Be Added, romantic relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-04-06 23:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14068374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuYeon/pseuds/SuYeon
Summary: A One Shot Collection with different platonic and/or romantic One Shots with Judar, Kougyoku, Hakuryuu, Hakuyuu, Hakuren and the reader.





	1. Ren Hakuryuu x female Reader

It had been a long and exhausting day for him. Too many meetings, too many discussions, too many voices – too many noise. He hadn’t felt good the last few days and after all this work today, he even felt worse than before. Maybe he got sick? He hoped not. Of course, his people knew what to do, in case he was sick, but what if something unexpected happened? What if something happened that needed his decision? He didn’t want to bother his sister to take care of things. She was quite busy herself. However, it also wasn’t advisable to work while being sick. Maybe he should stay in bed tomorrow? If he rested a little bit he would soon feel better, he was sure of that. Tomorrow he would stay in bed and today he would take a bath! A bath together with you, his wife! You wanted to do so for some time, but he had always rejected you, because he hadn’t felt well. You looked so sad and disappointed that it had broken his heart. But now he would make up for it! Although he was determined to do so, he barely moved forward. His legs were too weak and tiered to carry him to his bedroom faster.  
Since it was already night, it was cold outside and he didn’t wore appropriated clothes for this kind of weather. He had expected be finished sooner with today’s workload. The moon shone bright and gave the surrounding a surreal appearance. Hakuryuu felt like he wasn’t in the real world, although everything looked as normal as ever. Some months ago you had hang up some lanterns, because according to you it was too dark to see anything at night. Hakuryuu couldn’t agree, but he also wouldn’t argue about something so unimportant. More light was never a bad thing, so why trying to stop you? The lanterns were self-made by you, therefore they all were quite colorful and some looked like animals. It was a bit strange that you disliked the sunlight, but loved the light of the moon and the lanterns at night. Hakuryuu wondered, if you were already sleeping or did you run around? Sometimes you would run through the hallways of the palace without a specific goal, just running, wandering around. Maybe you were searching for something or you simply missed your home so much and used those little tours to distract yourself? As soon as less work had to be done, he would travel with you to your home country. He had liked it there a lot, but because of all his duties he barely had time to visit your country again.  
Very slowly Hakuryuu moved forward. He wished he would have already reached his bedroom. There it would be warm and he was sure it also would smile nice, because of the flowers you always brought with you. Last time it had smelt after some fruits instead of flowers, maybe this was the case today as well? He didn’t mind as long as it was a pleasant smell.

To not fall over, Hakuryuu had to support himself against the wall. Despite still being young, he felt so old at the moment. Maybe he should watch more after his health or do more training? His stamina seemed to have gotten worse. A sad thought, considering that not so long ago he could train without getting tired for hours. However, it also wasn’t really surprising, since he often sat around all day. Only when it was time for lunch or dinner, he had some “exercise”. Even his training sessions have been canceled, because he was so occupied with his paperwork. All he could do was to hope that soon things would get better, so he had more free time.  
“Hakuryuu!”, a female voice shout his name behind him.  
Without turning around he knew who had called him. You had spotted him on his way to their room and decided to follow him, although you wanted to go to the kitchen for some almost midnight snakes. You were a sweet tooth.  
When you reached him, you immediately pulled him into a tight hug, which caused Hakuryuu to almost lose his balance – almost because your tight grip made it impossible for him to fall.  
“I’ve missed you! Where have you been the whole day?”, you asked still hugging him.  
“Here and there and everywhere. I had many meetings today and every single one of them got prolonged. I am sorry that I hadn’t had any time to eat lunch or dinner with you. I promise, I will make up for it. How about we take a bath together? You always wanted to do this, right?”, Hakuryuu answered and returned your hug, although his hug wasn’t as tight as yours.  
He lacked the power to do so for now. Maybe he would hug you stronger next time, when he wasn’t about to fall asleep while standing in one of the many hallways of the palace.  
“Are you sure? You look really tired. Maybe you should go to bed. We can take a bath together tomorrow. I am not running away and the bath will stay there as well.”  
You let go of him and took a few steps away from him to have a better look. You looked very worried. From afar you had seen that he wasn’t well, but thought this was only due to him being exhausted, but now it looked more like he was sick.  
“I am sure. I feel so stiff and with a bath I think, I can solve this problem. You know, I cannot sleep, when everything hurts and feels uncomfortable.”  
It was nothing new for him to feel stiff and no matter how often you gave him a massage, it didn’t get better. On some days it was even so bad that he barely was able to move. Every other person would have probably sought out a physician, but Hakuryuu was different. He tried to ignore his problems, while hoping they would magically disappear therewith. Unfortunately, it hadn’t worked.  
“Um, if you say so.”  
You took his hand in yours. Only now Hakuryuu realized how cold he had been. Your hands were so warm and his so cold. It really was the best to get inside, since it was too cold outside – soon the first snow would fall.  
“Let’s go then”, you said with a smile on your face.  
Without any further delay the two of you made their way to your shared bedroom – it took quite some time, since Hakuryuu was not so fast after this exhausting day. You didn’t mind it. If Hakuryuu walked slowly, you had more time with him. When you reached your bedroom, you would take a bath and afterwards, you were sure, Hakuryuu would go to bed and fall asleep immediately. So you couldn’t have a nice conversation with him about each other’s day. However, when he walked slowly, you could use the time to talk to him and say everything you wanted to tell him, before he went to sleep. But as good as this plan sounded, it was no use, when you said nothing of the things you wanted to talk about. Instead of talking you hummed a song. Hakuryuu silently listened. He was used to you either talking a lot or barely saying anything – he liked both options. Whenever you talked like a waterfall, you were talking about your interests and then you always had a sparkling in your eyes. It was cute to see you so happy and open. Normally you were a quiet person, who seldom opened yourself up to others – just like him. So, when you were on fire because of your love for your interests and hobbies, Hakuryuu felt his heart warm up. He could listen to you for hours, although he often did not really understand, what you were talking about. You often told him about the stories you read, but it was hard to follow your explanations, therefore Hakuryuu had started to read the books you read, so he could talk about them with you. In return, you had started to learn more about politics. Now you were helping him out a lot with all his work – however, he knew that this was not a given and that you wouldn’t do anything too boring. But every helping hand was better than none. At the moment you spent a lot of time with the educational system of the empire and you were not pleased with how things had been until now. Whenever you were complaining about the current system, he would only listen to you, but stay silent. He knew you well enough to know that his words wouldn’t be of any use to you. You just needed someone to vent to.

When you two reached your bedroom, you went to the bathroom to prepare the bath. Hakuryuu on the other hand searched for his sleeping robes, which took him some minutes, because he somehow was too blind to see them. He really needed some sleep.  
Like he had expected the room smelled like some fruits – mandarins. Where did you get those from? And when? He hadn’t seen any mandarins around – not even in the kitchen, where he made your breakfast every morning. Well, who cares? There were more important things to worry about and he could always ask you. Maybe they had gotten the mandarins only today and since he was stuck in those boring and useless meetings, he didn’t know about it?  
“Ryuu, the water is ready! Are you ready?”, you asked him and came out of the bathroom to get some clothes for changing.  
“Yes, I am. What about you?”  
Hakuryuu had sat down on his side of the bed, while waiting for the bath to be ready – it was hard to not fall asleep there.  
“Almost, I just need some clothes. Let’s see…”  
It was amazing how hard it could be to decide what to wear in bed. Some of your clothes were too colorful, some were not colorful enough, some were not warm enough, while others were too warm. Somehow you were able to make it some kind of science to pick the right clothes – Hakuryuu wondered if you would find something before midnight or at least before he fell asleep.  
“Can I help you somehow?”, he asked.  
“Sure.”  
You showed him two night robes, one in a light blue with white stars on it – a gift from your older sister – and one in a deep red.  
“Take the blue one”, Hakuryuu said without thinking much.  
Red was far from being his favorite color. Also you looked better in blue than red!  
Skeptically you looked at his choice, but put the other one back in the wardrobe without any remarks. You had asked him for advice, so why should you not listen to him? In the end it did not matter what color you wore, but you wanted to look nice for Hakuryuu, even in bed – it wasn’t hard to look good for him, since Hakuryuu thought you were the most beautiful person and no matter what you wore this would never change.  
Now that you both had some cloths for changing and the bath was ready, there was nothing to stop you from enjoying a bath together.

The bathroom smelled nice. Hakuryuu assumed that you had put something into the water so it would smell like peaches. Judar would probably love this smell and would like to take a bath as well. Normally Judar did not like to get wet, so it was always a huge thing to get him to wash himself – although Judar also hated it to stink or to be sweaty. You and Judar were very much alike in this regard – but he would never say that out loud.  
After washing away all his sweat – you had helped him therewith and in return he had helped you, although you didn’t need any help, but you were lazy, Hakuryuu on the other hand was too tired, so a little bit of help was very welcomed – he went into the bathtub. Maybe he should have gone to bed instead of taking a bath. However, it was some kind of habit of his to take a bath before going to bed and he really couldn’t sleep well, when he felt stiff. Normally a hot bath helped him to relax, but normally he wasn’t as tired as he was now.  
“Hakuryuu, are you alright?”, you asked with a worried expression.  
“Yes, I am.”  
“Is the temperature of the water right? Or is it too warm? Or too cold? Want me to give you a massage?”  
“Don’t worry, don’t worry. The water is perfect and it smells so nice. You really are a genius with all your nice smelling fragrancies. They always make me feel good and it gives the rooms a nice atmosphere. Maybe I should do this with my bureau as well?”  
Hakuryuu was so used to his private room smelling like fruits or flowers that sometimes it even irritated him, when he was in another room that didn’t smell like that. At first the fragrancies had annoyed him and caused him some headache, but now that he was used to it, he didn’t want to miss it. Softly he pulled you into a hug. Your skin was soft and it felt nice. Once he had asked you, how you made sure that your skin was like this, but hadn’t got a good answer. “Because I think about you all day long and this makes me happy. And happy people always have nice skin”, you had said. He had only laughed about it. It was nice to hear that you thought of him very often and that he made you happy. He had caused a lot of pain to others, so to know that he also could cause others to be happy was a heart-balm.  
Although he wished to relax and have a nice bath with you, his stiffness had other plans and caused him pain. Therefore Hakuryuu backed out of the hug and tried to relax his limps a bit. At the moment he felt as if he had fought thousands of battles, although he only had sit around all day long. His head hurt, his limps hurt, he felt uncomfortable and was tired. Today was not his day. It was a bad day.  
“You have a lot on you mind, um? You should try not to think so much. If you want, you can think as much as you want tomorrow, but for now you should stop thinking. It’s not good for you.”  
You were right. He was thinking about the discussions he had all the time. There were many things that needed to be cleared before he could make a decision on this matters, but his mind already searched for solutions, before it even knew the details of the problems. Usually he wasn’t very creative, but when it was about making up bad outcomes or creating problems, there was no one, who could beat him! It was as if his mind saved all his creativity for those negative and sometimes even destructive thoughts. An extremely unhealthy habit of his. But how should he change his mind? He already tried his best to be more optimistic, but he wasn’t quite successful. He often made mountains out of molehills. You were much calmer than him. Sometimes it even seemed as if you didn’t care at all, but deep down you worried a lot about many things – like his well-being.  
“I know, but I cannot change it. There are so many things I have to take care of and everything is urgent.”  
“The only urgent thing right now is your health. If you do not look after yourself, you will soon not be able to work anymore, therefore won’t be able to take care of all these urgent matters. You need to rearrange your priorities!”  
“I will take a break tomorrow.”  
“Uh! That’s great! Than we can stay in bed all day long and cuddle!”  
You were so excited. It’s been a while since the last time the two of you had a whole day together. Your worried expression changed into a joyful. In your mind you already planned out your day in bed – as if you would leave it, when you didn’t have to! Happily you leant against him, taking his hand in yours and started to give it a little massage, while fantasying about all the things you could do tomorrow. The only thing Hakuryuu could thought of doing in bed was sleeping, but apparently one could also do a lot of other stuff. On the other hand, sleeping all day long didn’t sound that bad. Actually it sounded very nice. Without noticing it Hakuryuu’s eyes had fallen shut. He wasn’t asleep, for this his body still hurt too much from the slowly fading stiffness. The soft lips of yours on his own lips made him open his eyes again.  
“Let’s go to bed. I don’t want you to fall asleep here and are drowning. Also it is warm in our bed and more comfortable.”  
Since there was no reason to reject your suggestion – he wasn’t too relaxed, but it was better than before the bath, so it was better to leave now before he really fell asleep –, they got out of the bath and into their bed. However, you would not immediately lay down and sleep, although Hakuryuu was about to do exactly that. First of all you insisted on making his hair, so it would not look like a bird’s nest in the morning. Afterwards it was his turn to do yours. You simply loved it, when he made your hair, so he always had to do it in the morning and before you went to bed. In return you would also make his. Sometimes you would try out a few new things with his hair, but in the end his hairstyle never really changed, because Hakuryuu did not really care and you loved his hairstyle the way it was.  
“Lay down”, you gently ordered him.  
Without complains he did what you said. Honestly, this was also what he wanted to do all the time. Lay down in his comfortable bed and sleep. Although you didn’t say anything about sleeping, he would probably do so, because he was so tired. Your plan was to give him a massage to get rid of the last bit of stiffness inside him, so he could rest well tonight. And indeed your little massage helped him a lot to relax. He could feel the softness of his bed, smell the nice scent of mandarins and feel your warm hands on his skin. Slowly but steadily he drifted into the land of dreams.  
“I love you”, he whispered as you stealthy place a gentle kiss on his shoulder.


	2. Judar x male Reader

You knew that you weren’t liked by many of your male fellows, but couldn’t care less about it. They all underestimated the power of women, however you would use said power to its fullest. Was it nice? No. Was is fine? No. Did you care? No, no and no! In the Kou Empire people only valued physical strength. A magician like you was considered weak and strange. Some even feared you, because of your power. Therefore you barely had any friends. Your closest friend was the Magi Judar. A Magi was a magician as well, however differently than a normal magician a Magi could not only use his own magical energy, but also that around him. Furthermore, a Magi could summon dungeons and lead their kings inside to obtain a djinn – a powerful magical being. No matter how much the people of the Kou Empire feared and dislike magic, they wouldn’t deny the chance of obtaining more power for their war. Nowadays it was common knowledge that a djinn was so powerful that it alone could decide the outcome of a fight. Every big nation had at least one djinn and tried to get more. As a magician you couldn’t gain a djinn, because your magic and the magic of the djinn would interfere with each other. However, you were of the opinion that you didn’t need a djinn anyway. A powerful magician would not lose out to a djinn, since the amount of magic and how powerful it was, depended on the magical energy, called Magoi, of the djinn user.  
Since no one paid attention to you, you had plenty of time and opportunities to strengthen your body and increase you magical knowledge. The latter was a bit harder, since the Kou Empire barely had any resources, but you were creative. Sometimes Judar helped you or simply watched you, while you were training. Since that guy was probably the laziest person you had ever met, he never helped you with your physical exercises. Yet this was totally fine. Judar could be unbelievable annoying and you had to wonder from time to time, how you were able to keep up with that guy. Most people acted nice towards Judar, because of his position, but you didn’t care about it. How many time had you already insulted him? How many times had you thrown a few attacks at him, when he was annoying again? How many times had you lectured him? How many times had you ordered him around? Too many times. It really was surprising that you never had received any punishment. Of course, Judar would try to take revenge, after you attacked him or tried to teach you a lesson, after you lectured him, but in the end it never was anything severe.

In general the relationship between the two of you was quite strange. One the one hand, you often had the urge to punch Judar in the face, just so he would shut up, while at the same time you simply wanted to pull him into a long and tight hug. Thanks to your little intern intelligent you knew about Al-Thamen and about Judar’s past – things not even he knew. The reason you hadn’t told him, was your own uncertainty about what would happen afterwards. Furthermore, you had no physical proof.  
Judar wasn’t a nice guy. He was mean through and through. Annoying people or even harming them caused him pleasure and he loved to abuse his high status in the empire to get whatever he wanted. Whoever dared to deny him would be punished. The only expectation were the royal family and the members of Al-Thamen. You were neither part of the royal family nor a part of Al-Thamen, yet you never got any severe punishment for your disobedience. Funnily enough no one had ever commented or realized this fact. Maybe because most people didn’t know how you treated Judar, while you thought you simply hadn’t offended him enough for him to come after you with all he got. Well, whatever it was, you didn’t care. You were fine and this was all that mattered.  
If you had paid a little bit more attention, you would have seen that Judar’s eyes showed some kind of sadness and remorse, when you were hurt because of him. You would have seen how he looked at all those women you were giving compliments to. You would have realized that Judar’s feeling for you were more intense and complicated that a simply friendship or companionship. Subconsciously you were indeed aware of all these things, but likewise you also subconsciously tried to deny it – make excuses.

Funnily it was the anniversary of yours and Judar’s first meeting that brought an end to your subconscious denial.  
_Today many years ago, you had already begun to spin your internal intelligent web, Judar interfered with your conversation with one of the servants. Your father was a soldiers – one out of many without any specific function or status – and your mother was a simple maid. During the day you barely saw her, as if she tried to avoid you. Your father was always busy with whatever work he had to do as soldier and couldn’t care less about you. Pretty early on it was evident that you were a magician. Something that no one really understood and therefore feared. Out of fear people avoided you and your kind – you all were suppressed. As a child you still had it easier. No one would dare to harm you, well at least as long as you did not show of your magic. Yet, although people would not harm you physically, people avoided you and this included your own parents. Because of this you had to learn many things on your own and understood a bit too soon how cruel and unreasonable the world was. If you wanted to survive and not end up like some other magicians you had to work hard. So you started to gain the approval of the people in the palace. Not everyone knew about you and your power, so you hid them well, while making friends. Target to your plan were other children and the maids. Luckily people underestimated children and therefore didn’t suspect anything, whenever you made them compliments – everyone had their own issues and as long as you knew what they were worried about the most, you could use that to your advantage. It also was useful later one, when more and more people unknowingly became part of you little web – it would be troublesome, if you told one of the maids she had the prettiest hair, while another one was around that had gotten the same compliment form you. Internal fighting had to be avoided!_

 _“Your hands are really pretty. When I’m big, I want to have such pretty hands too”, you said with your childish voice sounding more innocent than needed to._  
“I am sure, you will have pretty hands when you are grown up. You will be a very handsome man by then.”  
“Will you marry me than?”  
For whatever reason most of the maids like it, when you asked them, if they would marry you, when you were an adult. Until now they all had rejected, yet still smiled and seemed happy when you asked again. This kind of behavior didn’t seem logical to you, but as long as it served its purpose you wouldn’t complain.  
“Oh, I would love to, but I think, when you finally turn into an adult, I will already be married with someone else. You see I am already quite old, so I need to marry soon. I am sorry, but you will surely find a pretty young lady around your age by then.”  
Another rejection. You looked at the ground. Although you didn’t want to marry her and only said it, because it would make her happy, you acted as if her rejection hurt you.  
“But when you’re not married by then, we can get married, right?”  
“Yeah, than we can get married.”  
You gave her your sweetest smile in response.  
Unbeknownst to you and the maid, your conversation had been overheard by a young boy with raven black hair and glowing red eyes. From the expression it was evident that he was not pleased with what he had heard. The boy approached you and the maid – behind him two masked men. 

_“Stop talking bullshit”, the boy demanded with his high pitched voice and if you hadn’t been a child yourself, you probably wouldn’t have taken the other one serious._  
Annoyed and angry you immediately replied: “I’m not talking bullshit, idiot!”  
The maid had respectfully bowed towards the other boy and the masked men, which you had not paid attention to. Also her gasping, when she heard your “idiot” went over your head. This time you weren’t pretending, you really were angry at the other one. Honestly, who liked it to be told that they were talking bullshit? Moreover, what if the maid took the words of the black haired boy serious and thought you had lied to her – which was true, but she didn’t need to know that, right?  
“You are the idiot! Do you even know, who you are talking to? I am Judar, the great Magi of the Kou Empire! Bow down idiot!”  
Magi? You had never heard that word before. Consequently you looked at Judar in confusion and innocently asked, what a Magi even was. From Judar’s clothing you had already suspected that he was someone with a high status, but you couldn’t tell how much higher he was compared to you. Was a Magi such a high status that the son of a mere servant not even had heard of it before? Sounded strange and somewhat unrealistic. A servant needed to know the different positions of the nobles to ensure that everyone was treated in the right way, so to not tell them what a Magi was or how high that position was, was unreasonable and unrealistic. One the other hand, you weren’t a servant, but just the son of one, so of course no one had told you about the Magi.  
“You really are an idiot!”  
The arrogance in Judar’s voice increased your anger, but for now you kept silent. Judar, on the other hand, started his totally exaggerated explanation of what a Magi was and how he was the most amazing among them all. You weren’t listening. Seriously that guy could go to hell for all you cared! Never before in your short life had you met a child so arrogant and self-absorbed. Due to being surrounded by nobles all the time, you were used to a certain level of ignorance and arrogance, but the boy really was too much. How would turn thing out in the future? Would he be even worse than now? Or would he maybe have a change of heart and turn at least a bit more humble? Probably not.  
Despite not listening to Judar, you still were aware when he stopped his bragging. A triumphing smile had formed itself on Judar’s lips.  
“I and the pretty aunty will still marry each other, when I am grown up. Let’s go aunty. We shouldn’t waste our precious time with that idiot!”  
Without another word you grabbed the maids hand and turned around. You had wasted enough time with that stupid brat other there! Differently than that brat you had important stuff to do! And the maid was even busier! Children shouldn’t stop adults from fulfilling their duties! But this was something a spoiled idiot like that Judar probably didn’t know or cared for. 

_From this day onwards you always spoke louder and clearer, whenever Judar was near, when you made a compliment towards one of the many maids. Your little web grew bigger and bigger with every passing day and so grew the chances to annoy Judar. Sometimes he interfered with your conversations, but strangely most of the time the just stood wherever he was and glared at you – or better said the maid, yet you always thought you were the target of this glare._

Today was the anniversary of said first meeting and you were practicing your magic. For this you had gone to an abandoned training ground of the soldiers. The training ground was a bit isolated so barely anyone passed by. Of course, the maids knew where you trained and passed by “accidentally” every now and then. This way quite a crowd had formed around you and your training had long since turned into a little show off – you didn’t want to let them see your true power, so you focused on showing them some fancy magic that was simply nice to look at, but posed no threat. The maids didn’t mind this, you didn’t mind it much either – it was a bit annoying since you had to waste time for this, but this also strengthen their good impression of you –, but someone else wasn’t happy at all. Judar watched you since the beginning and didn’t like the attention all those maids gave you and even more did he hate the fact that you had changed your powerful magic into something totally boring! He wanted to see destructive power and not some boring shit!  
You hadn’t seen Judar, because he sat on the roof behind your back. Even if you had seen him, you probably hadn’t cared, because you had to take care of the maids. After you finished your training they all made you compliments about your magic, which you received with a big smile and humble words – as if they truly knew how good your magic was.  
In the end it was your turn to make them compliments about their hair, hands, eyes, face, clothes, intelligent and so on. Due to doing this all the time, the words came out of your mouth without thinking. It was something you did automatically. Somehow this was kind of sad. Were you even able to make an honest compliment? No one knew, because until now you never had made one and there never had been anyone, you wanted to give an honest compliment to. Maybe you would be sad about such a thing, when the people around you were different. Being like this was the only way for you to survive and live a life without fear. How many magicians were used for experiments? No matter how secretive the royal family was, you already knew about their inhumane researches. For power, for war, they would do anything! And so you were ready to do anything as well!

“Stop talking bullshit, idiot”, a very familiar voice suddenly shouted at you.  
While rolling your eyes, you let go of the hand of one of the maids. Your previously very calm expression with a faint smile on your lips turned into an expression filled with annoyance and disdain. Why did this guy have to be such an ass? Why was he here anyway? If he wanted to train with you, he should have said so. As much as you hated his attitude, there was no way of denying that he was a great magician. To practice your combat abilities, it was the best to have a training partner. That role was often taken by Judar and you were indeed thankful for that.  
“What do you want?”, you asked with your arms crossed.  
“How stupid are you? Didn’t I just said that I want you to shut up?”  
“Well, to be exact you said “stop talking bullshit”, which is a bit different than telling me to shut up. So, how about you leave me alone, when you don’t like what I have to say? No one is stopping you.”  
Now Judar looked angry as well. He was angry! How dared you to talk him like that? Yet he did not move. He didn’t attack you right away, like he would have done with someone else. Still, his grip around his staff tighten. You may act calm outside, but Judar’s change still frighten you – at least a little bit, since you knew very well how strong the other one was. Yes, you could defended yourself against Judar and theoretically you were even stronger than him – however, he was a Magi and more or less had endless access to Magoi, while you only had the little bit of it inside you. As long as Judar was able to protect himself against your attacks with his Borg or was able to avoid your attacks at all, he would win, because you were the one, who would run out of Magoi first. Furthermore, there were also the maids around you. Judar had absolutely no problems with hurting them, but you did! So, in the end you wouldn’t only have to protect yourself, but also the maids. The winner was already known before anything could even start. Still you acted calm and unfazed. All you needed was a chance to send the maids away – it had to appear naturally, so that Judar wouldn’t know about your feelings. That guy might act dumb most of the time, but he was good at seeing others behaving weak – whether this weakness was shown unintentionally or not, was a different story.

Judar had sat on the roof behind your back, so you hadn’t seen him. However, now that he had come down, he slowly made his way towards you, not hiding his anger. The maids were already backing away. Differently than you, they greeted Judar respectfully out of fear of punishment. Still none of them run away for now. Maybe they were too afraid to run or didn’t know whether it was appropriated to do so. What if they run and later it was seen as disrespectful by the Magi? They would be in deep trouble. Your bravery wasn’t seen as heroic, but as stupid. All of them knew that your relationship with Judar was different from others, yet there was a limit even for you. From the looks of it, it seemed that you just reached said limit.  
One of the maids tugged at your sleeve and whispered in your ear. It was a warning, but as usual you did not take it seriously, however you used her warning as a chance to send the women away. They would only be in the way.  
By the time all the maids had left Judar was standing right in front of you. Since Judar was taller than you, you had to look up, when you wanted to see into his blood red eyes – he obviously like the fact that you had to look up. How pitiful!  
“So what now?”, you asked as nonchalant as possible.  
“Well, now I will teach you a lesson, so you stop talking that bullshit all the time.”  
“Then, before you start teaching me, how about you tell me what that bullshit is that I should stop talking. I mean, if I don’t know what exactly I said wrong, I cannot change it and your lesson may be in vain.”  
“Huh? So you really are that stupid, idiot”, Judar said while backing away a few steps making an exaggerated hand gesture.  
At this moment you didn’t want to do anything more than to punch that ass in his smug face! Of course, throughout the years you had also observed Judar’s reactions towards you and the maids, just to make sure that you would never cross the line and endanger the maids or yourself. During this time you had already formed an idea of what Judar might mean. Yet it was nothing more than your assumption. Acting on said assumption could be quite dangerous, so you wanted him to tell you what he meant. Playing safe was the best for now.  
“Well, than let me enlighten you, dumbass. You can consider yourself lucky that I am such a forgivable and understanding person. So listen carefully!”  
Could that guy get any more annoying and arrogant? Why the hell had you to keep up with that asshole?  
“First of all, I hope your stupid brain can still remember, what you said just a moment ago to that maid.”  
“Sure, I made her a compliment about her soft and beautiful hair.”  
“Good, than listen up. Telling lies is one thing, however, to me it seems that you mean that shit that you said. Beautiful hair? Really? Do you not have any eyes or are you blind? Do you even know the meaning of what you said? Look, when you want them to fall for you and your lies, you need to know when you’re talking shit, but you are not aware at all. How stupid can you be? Over the years I heard you say a lot of this shit! Also when you lie, you need to tell a believable lie! Why do you think I always called you out on it? All my efforts in helping you were simply ignored! We’re no children anymore!”, Judar explained, while making some unnecessary movements.  
Maybe he wanted to give his words more weight that way, but in the end it only looked kind of funny. Therefore they didn’t help him and his words to sound less childish and idiotic. The worst was probably the fact that first of all Judar meant his words and second he didn’t stop just with the few sentences. He had more to say!  
When Judar had been willing to give you an explanation of his “stop talking bullshit”, you actually were curious about the meaning behind it and had assumed it to be something surprising and unusual. However, you hadn’t expected to be unusual and surprising in such a way. He wasn’t really pissed about you making compliments to some maids? That was ridiculous! He was playing pretend right now, wasn’t he?

While listening to Judar’s explanation, you had a hard time not to laugh out loud and lose all composure. Apparently he just tried to lecture you on beauty, when someone’s hair could be considered nice or how the hands of someone had to look like to be nice and so on. More than once – actually all the time – he used himself as reference and of course every part of his body was perfect!  
With one hand you tried to cover your mouth that was already twitching, because it wanted to smile, wanted to laugh. Your brain only partly paid attention to Judar’s words. The other part was busy with wondering whether this all was real. It almost sounded as if Judar was jealous. As if!  
There was absolutely no reason for Judar to be jealous. He got everything he wanted! All he had to do was to say the word and the empire would set out to get it. One could considered him another prince, despite not being of royal heritage. Why should someone like him be jealous of a few maids that got some superficial compliments?

A thought slowly creeped into your mind. What if Judar wanted to get a compliment from you? Thinking back, you really never had given him any compliments, not even for his magic. But this was so childish! If he wanted a compliment, he should have said so! If he wanted attention from you, than he should have said so – you already paid attention to him, since one could consider the two of you as friends. But at the moment it seemed as if you had purposefully ignored Judar, who was now trying to get your attention. Somehow this was so surreal. Judar was an adult, maybe not a mature one, but still an adult. The same applied to you, minus the mature part. You were a mature adult. Or not.  
In all honesty, hadn’t you done something similar all those years? Whenever Judar had been near you, when you gave compliments to the maids, you would speak a bit louder and clearer, so that Judar would definitely hear you. You wanted to see his reactions and were quite disappointed, when he didn’t react. It was all for fun, to entertain yourself. Well, at least that was what you had told yourself all the time, but was this true? Was it worth endangering your life, just to get a funny reaction out of Judar? Was it worth to endanger the life of a maid, just for your own entertainment? Judar may have never harmed you, but what was with the maids? Had he punished them? Since all the maids always came back to you, you had never thought about it like this, but now your thoughts run wild.  
While you were deep in thoughts, Judar chattered nonstop about this and that and how stupid you were and how the maids were all ugly, especially compared to him. That guy definitely didn’t lack confident! However, what he lacked was normal brain!

Since you had thought a lot, you hadn’t paid too much attention to Judar’s words – you knew what he had said, but hadn’t paid attention to his exact words and honestly you wouldn’t be able to repeat them. Therefore, when your attention was focused back on Judar without distraction all of a sudden, you heard only the last half of his sentence and broke out in laughter. Ultimately Judar had done it. With his complains about you making compliments towards the “ugly” maids, he had cause you to laugh out loud. You laughed so hard, that your stomach started to hurt and tears streamed down your cheeks. At some point you even needed the wall to support you, because you laughed so hard. Judar, on the other hand, wasn’t amused at all! What was there to laugh about? He seriously explained important matters to you and you laughed about them? What the hell was wrong with you? Judar got angrier and angrier with ever second you laughed. The air around him turned colder and colder. He was an ice magician and ready to murder. When you looked at him for a short second, you saw his ugly expression and tried to calm down, which was harder than expected. Truth be told, you didn’t even knew yourself, why you were laughing so hard. Was is simply because of Judar’s words? Or was it because of the assumption that the other one wanted your attention and was jealous of the maids? Or was it because your brain was able to come up with such an absurd thought? Or was because you had to admit that you had tried to gain Judar’s attention with your compliments towards the maids, which could also be interpreted as flirting at times. Or was it maybe a mix of all of it? Who knew? All you knew was that you needed to stop laughing or else you would be dead very soon – either because Judar killed you with his ice magic or because of asphyxiation.

Luckily nothing happened. After ending your laughing session you took a few deep breaths to calm down a bit more. Your face was red from all the laughing.  
Wiping away a tear you asked: “Sorry for that, but it’s just too funny that you are lecturing me on beauty. Could it be that you are jealous of those maids that receive my attention and compliments?”  
From all the people in the palace, you were one of the few that understood Judar. Most saw him as an arrogant brat, who they had to obey due to his status. Indeed, Judar was an arrogant brat and he was ignorant, easy to manipulate, but he was also very lonely and sought attention and validation. However, he would never admit such a thing. Consequently, it wouldn’t be too strange or surprising, when he really was jealous and simply wanted your attention. Judar wasn’t good with sharing, this included sharing friends as well. Yet that thought was still a bit weird, since you paid him attention during your training sessions and whenever you two held a normal conversation every now and then. Funnily, during those conversation Judar had never complaint about the bullshit you were saying to the maids.  
“Of course not! Have you lost your mind or what? You can’t be that stupid, can you? Why should I be jealous of a bunch of maids? I am Judar, the Magi of Kou! I am far above your and those maids’ existences! All I wanted was to teach you low lives, but all I get is that? Tsk.”  
“Sure, sure. Whatever. I will take my leave, since I am too stupid to understand your very important lesson and will probably never stop talking bullshit.”  
With these words you bid your farewell.

Instead of turning around and walking away, however, you walked towards Judar. There was nothing wrong with choosing this way or the other, since both would led you away from the training ground. For you walking towards Judar was the only right way, since you wanted to try something out. Judar may never admit the reason, why he made such a fuss about this matter, so you had to get your confirmation with an underhanded method. If your previous assumption was right, than everything was fine and may get better in the future. However, if you were wrong, than things might get a bit troublesome after your little confirmation test. Yet, this was a matter to worry about later. For now you needed all your courage to even go through with your plan. A part of you was actually excited about it, while another part was telling you that right now you really were an idiot and that you should stop at once! But when have you ever listen to yourself? If you had, you probably wouldn’t have such a large network of little spies and would probably be just a weakling that was pushed around by everyone else – and you would probably not friends with Judar.  
Judar was a bit taller than you, a fact the other one liked a lot. For you it didn’t mean much, since the difference in height barely affected any interaction between the two of you. This time, however, it did affect your interaction with the other one, since you had to stand up on your tiptoes. Honestly, you had never done this before in front of another human, so you felt kind of weird, also Judar’s face was quite close – a little bit too close, but else your plan won’t work.  
Despite getting closed in by you, Judar didn’t move. He was angrily staring at you, as if he wanted to kill you with his gaze alone. It really was a good thing that people couldn’t die from just a look! Who knew how many times you would have died today or in any of your interactions with the Magi?  
His pretty, angry face changed expression all of a sudden, when he felt something warm and soft on it. To be more accurate, when felt something warm and soft on this lips. His whole body started to stiffen. What the hell?

“What the hell” was a very good question, but one without an answer. As sudden and fast as you had kissed Judar, so sudden and fast did you pull away and moved one. It had been just a mere second in which you looked into Judar’s eyes, but it was more than enough to see the confusion. It wasn’t enough to confirm your assumption, this was something that could only be determined later, and it wasn’t enough to satisfy your curiosity, but you had to run now! In case you had just committed the worst mistake in your short life, you needed to get some distant between yourself and the other one, so you were able to defend yourself – or prepare to leave the country, the continent, this universe, whatever!

It was just sad that you weren’t able to see Judar’s face now that you “run” away. How great would it have been to see is confused look slowly turning into realization? How great would it be to know right away what the other one thought and felt about your action? Too great! Maybe your little network could provide you with some information, before you had to face Judar once again. With a big smile on your face, you went down the hallway. It cost quite some self-control not to start laughing or humming. The risks for this move had been worth it – especially when a few days later a certain someone was standing at your door demanding another kiss.


	3. Kougyoku x female Reader

Silently you combed her hair. Her hair had such a beautiful color. Red. An unusual color for an unusual empress. You knew her since she was a little kid and now you and her were both adults – she was the newly crowned empress of the Kou Empire and you were her maid. Time surely flew by and life had many twists and turns. Not so long ago none of you had thought that she would be the empress one day, a few years ago she had been nothing but the eight princess of the Kou Empire, who was almost married of two times. Your heart had almost stopped beating both times. If she really had been married of, you wouldn’t be able to spent time with her anymore – and just the thought of all the things she might have to endure during her forced marriage made you mad! Luckily now that she was the empress, no one could force her anymore. No one could take her away from you anymore! Yet none of you were smiling.

After many years of loving her from afar, you were finally able to get close to her, to become hers, and yet there barely was any time to enjoy your time together. Since the end of the civil war the empire was crumbling and now Hakuryuu had to go into hiding, which caused Kougyoku to take over the throne quite suddenly. She hadn’t been prepared, but she did her best. Unfortunately, her best wasn’t enough to hold the empire together. More and more people left the empire. This caused the economic to slip even more. It was a vicious cycle. Kougyoku, her ministers and advisors tried to break this cycle day and night, but couldn’t find a solution. Her beautiful smile had been gone a long time ago. When was the last time you had seen it? The last time seemed so far away, as if it had been in another lifetime. One in which the world was alright and not about to fall apart. Well, honestly the world wasn’t falling apart at all; it was just the Kou Empire that slowly faded away. Sometimes you wondered what would happen with Kougyoku and yourself, when king Sinbad finally reached his goal of destroying the empire. You didn’t mind living a normal life as long as Kougyoku was at your side, but what was with Kougyoku, who only knew the pampered life in the palace? She would adapt somehow, but would her heart be able to handle it? She had already lost so much, how would she be able to accept and handle losing her home – the place where she grow up and lived in since she was born? On some days you wanted to slap yourself for these thought, as if just thinking about all this would make it into a reality. On other days you started to make plans and preparations, in case these thought became a reality. Today was one of those rare days in which you did neither of these things.

Shortly Kougyoku needed to attend another meeting regarding the slipping condition of the empire and how to solve their problems. As if one meeting was enough for such a thing to happen! How many times had they already talked about possible solutions, but never found one that helped? Reforming the laws could only do so much and reforms needed time to show results, but they didn’t have time!   
You placed a soft kiss on her head. It saddened you that you didn’t know how to help her. Your knowledge of politics and economic was quite limited, so all you could do was provide her with your loyalty and love. No matter what, you wouldn’t leave her side!  
Elegant fingers were placed on your hands, which you had rested on her shoulders before you gave her a kiss.   
“I’m fine”, she said in a soft voice.   
“I know, but I am not fine”, you answered.   
It was a lie. It was the opposite. You were fine, while she wasn’t at all. However, she wanted to appear strong. Maybe she wanted to ease your worries or wanted to deceive herself. Yet you couldn’t call her out on that, so you simply lied to her about your feelings. This was a little white lie! Totally acceptable! You would never lie to her for real! Both of you knew it anyways. All the affection you gave – no matter how big or small – were mainly to comfort her, not to comfort yourself.  
“It’s time to go.”  
The meeting wouldn’t start without the empress, but it also wouldn’t make a good impression, when the empress was late – there was no fashionable late in this case.   
“Yeah. Wish me luck!”  
“I will. I am sure that you will soon find a way out of this predicament. When you return I will be here, waiting for you with your favorite dish!”  
Your cooking skills were kind of miserably, but always tried to improve, so you could pamper your beloved empress in every possible way! Also you wanted to bake with her together, without turning her creations into an uneatable mess. It happened once and since that time you took cooking lessons. Nowadays your skills were still miserably, but you were able to cook a few dishes without making them into poisons weapons.   
“Don’t overwork yourself!”, she ordered you with such a serious tone that you were almost certain that she meant it as a joke.  
Wasn’t it her who was overworked? Who didn’t know when to stop? Who fell asleep in her working room more than in her bedroom? Wasn’t it her, who obviously lacked sleep and drifted into an unhealthy eating and sleeping lifestyle? Someone should look at themselves before lecturing others! In the end, you said nothing but “yes”.

Due to the bad economic situation many of the servants had also left the palace. Consequently your workload had increased, but you didn’t mind it too much. During your years as maid you had done almost every possible job inside the palace, so you had no problem with doing more than just help Kougyoku get dressed. While she was at the meeting you cleaned her room, took care of her dresses and accessories, prepared her lunch and studied some political and economic related books as well as poetries. Although neither politic nor economic was anything interesting to you, you decided to learn about it, so you could understand your empress’ worries better and talk about it with her, in case she wanted to talk about it after all those meetings. When she doesn’t want to talk, you could read her some poetries or make your own – until now she had always liked to listen to your poetries. To your surprise you were quite good at it.  
Your family was from a small village at the border of the Kou Empire. During the war between Kou, Go and Gai your family had to leave their home. Your father died. Luckily your uncle was a higher ranked solider and was able to give your mother and you a place in the palace. Your mother became a servant and you followed in her footsteps as soon as you were old enough. Although the other servant often looked down on you and your mother, none of them dared to say anything, because they knew that your uncle had a higher status then them and was friends with some even more powerful people – they still talked behind closed doors. However, you didn’t pay any attention to those people. All you wanted was to do fine, so you wouldn’t bring any shame upon your mother or uncle – a few years later your uncle and mother married each other.

When you first met Kougyoku, she had looked so lost. Like a child that was forced to act like an adult, surrounded by so many thing it couldn’t understand and was scared of. Kougyoku was too shy to approach others, so she only watched them from afar, while she wished they would notice and interact with her. You were a servant or better said the daughter of a servant, who were you to simply approach a princess! You had no right to do so! Therefore, you only watched her from afar, while wishing she would notice and interact with you.  
The first person you served wasn’t the princess, but the empress Ren Gyokuen. Honestly, you had never liked that woman. She had always creeped you out! For you it wasn’t surprising at all that this woman was a manic that killed her husband and children! Yet, you could understand that it was indeed shocking and surprising for others. Too many liked to believe in what they saw instead of looking deeper into it. It was easier to believe what you wanted. It was all because of that woman that your beloved Kougyoku had to suffer like this now! If you could, you would kill that woman – would make her suffer as much as Kougyoku suffered right now! You knew no mercy for your enemies – for Kougyoku’s enemies! King Sinbad was also on your list! He also had to die a painful death. But in the end, nothing would happen to those two, since you lacked the power to do anything – no one had the power to do anything to those two monsters!

The meeting had taken longer than expected, although this was not surprising at all. Since when did a meeting take as long as expected? Yet you always felt uneasy, when Kougyoku needed longer to return to her private chambers. You always feared that something might have happened to her. Maybe she was crying somewhere alone? You didn’t want her to cry or to be alone. Not so long ago, you had always started to search for her, when she wasn’t back in time. Nowadays, you knew better than this – you still worried a lot, but knew that things did not always went according to plan, especially political meetings. Also you didn’t want to look like a possessive or obsessive girlfriend.  
When Kougyoku returned she looked like she was through a day full of physical exercises, but it was only noon. Without saying anything she sat down at the table you had prepared and started to eat. Usually the two of you had a small conversation during lunch, but today it was silent. It was obvious that the meeting didn’t went well. Unsure whether to ask what happened, you ate you serving.   
“Do you want to take a little nap? You look tired”, you said with concern in your voice after a long time of silence.   
“No, I need to think of a solution. We need to find one as soon as possible.”  
“But thinking while being tired is not a good idea. I am sure that you can find a solution sooner, when you also rest well. It’s just a shot nap, a few minutes of think more or less won’t change much.”  
Seeing how much Kougyoku cared hurt, seeing how much the current situation hurt her was painful, seeing how she needed help hurt. There was nothing you could do! You felt so powerless, so useless, so angry and hurt. All you wanted was to be at her side and see her smile – you wanted her to be happy. Was it really impossible to grant such a small wish?

For the nap you used the large sofa in Kougyoku’s bedroom. Of course, she could also lay down in her bed, but she feared that she wouldn’t get up later, when it was time to proceed further with the meeting – also it wasn’t all too comfortable for you.  
You sat down at one end of the sofa and placed a pillow on your lap. Kougyoku then laid down, placing her head on the pillow on your lap. Tenderly you stroke through her hair. What a beautiful red! So bright and strong, just like her!  
“Say, why do you love me?”, Kougyoku suddenly asked.  
“Um… Let’s see. I love you, because seeing you happy and well makes me feel warm and happy. I love your optimism and enthusiasm. I love how you care and love the people around you, how you work hard to reach your goals. I love your dreamy side, when you fantasies about the future. Some may call it childish and unbefitting of an empress, but I really like that about you. You are so soft and kind, so tender and bright, yet so strong and stubborn, so fierce and decisive. I know that people often underestimate you and that you yourself often underestimate yourself, but I know that you are a great person with some many hidden strengths. I love you, because to me you are perfect in your imperfection. I love you, because being with you makes me happy.”  
A moment of silence followed. You didn’t mind, although you were a bit sad that you weren’t able to word yourself better. It was hard to say why you loved her exactly. Most of your reason were really trivial and theoretically could apply to everyone, yet it was only her that made you feel and think this way. Love didn’t follow reason.   
“Why do you love me?”, you asked her back after a while.   
“Um, I don’t know. I love you, because you are you. You’re always so calm, no matter what and this is so reassuring and calming during these times. You’re always listening to me and my rambling. When I’m with you, I don’t feel lonely anymore. I feel like, I finally found a family.”   
From the tone of her voice you could tell that she didn’t feel well with admitting that she had so specific reason for loving you.   
“So you love me, because I’m your family?”   
You knew her well enough that explaining her that she didn’t need a specific reason to feel the way she felt was useless, so you tried to help her find a satisfying reason for her. Loving your family was something natural, hence when she loved you because you were family, she had a pretty good reason for loving you without much explanation.   
“Yeah.”

Another round of silence engulfed you two and at some point you were certain that Kougyoku had finally fallen asleep. Consequently, when she suddenly asked you another question you almost jump up from the sofa – luckily you didn’t or else your beloved empress would have fallen down on the hard floor.   
“When did you fall in love with me?”  
When? Good question?  
“Huh… That’s a good question. Let me think.”  
You took your time to remember, when you fell in love with her, but you couldn’t find said moment. Absentmindedly you played with her long red hair. It was so soft and smelt really nice.   
“I guess, I fell in love with you, when we first met. However, only after you were sent to Balbadd to marry that pig of a king, I realized my feelings.”  
It was true, ever since you met her, you felt drawn towards her, but never had you been able to tell why. It had been just a feeling – a feeling you had never felt before and you also had no one to ask. So you simply thought that you wanted to be friends with Kougyoku, due to the similarities you two shared – because she had been just as lonely as you. When the marriage with the king of Balbadd had been decided upon and Kougyoku had left the Empire, you finally understood what you felt. Back then you had thought it was too late and regretted not understanding yourself sooner. There were no words to descript how happy you felt, when Kougyoku returned. From that day on you did everything in your power to deliver her your feelings without endangering your friendship with her. In the end, you succeed!  
“This is a long time. Why haven’t you said anything sooner?”  
“Because I didn’t want to destroy our friendship. How was a supposed to know what you were feeling? What if you didn’t love me back? Wouldn’t this make things awkward between us? So all I could do, was trying to tell you my feelings without saying it. And in the end, it worked out, didn’t it?”  
“But it could have gone wrong as well.”  
“But it did not. And even when it would have gone wrong, we still would be together. Maybe not as a couple, but at least a friends. I would have been fine with that as well, as long as I can be at your side and see you smile, I don’t care, whether I am you girlfriend or not. All I want is you to be happy and fine. Now that I am your girlfriend it is so much easier to ensure that you are fine and happy – although it doesn’t always work, especially in our current situation.”  
“Don’t say that. I am very thankful for everything you’ve done for me so far. Without you at my side I would have probably given up a long time ago. I probably wouldn’t even had found the strength and courage to pick up the crown and become the empress, despite my love for my home country. Without you at my side, I would have given in to king Sinbad’s demands a long time ago, destroying the little bit of sovereignty the Kou Empire has left. I would have disappointed my family and made their efforts meaningless. So, thank you! I love you!”  
Without a warning Kougyoku turned around and kissed you.   
“Your welcome.”  
And so you kissed her back.


End file.
